Album Review: Cavalera Conspiracy – Inflikted

Inflikted is the debut album by Cavalera Conspiracy, a groove/thrash metal band, which marks the first musical reunion of the Cavalera brothers – Max and Igor – since the 1996 break-up of legendary thrash metal band Sepultura.

With Max taking rhythm guitar and vocal duties, Igor on drums, Marc Rizzo (Soulfly) on lead guitar and Gojira frontman and guitarist Joe Duplantier on bass, this album, although nothing groundbreaking, is pretty badass. It will have most metal fans fairly excited and most Sepultura fans creaming their pants over the reunion of the Cavalera brothers, because this is probably as close to a new Sepultura album as they are going to get.

Musically, the album is extremely tight. The riffs are heavy, the drumming is impeccable and the leads are pretty spectacular. Notably absent (insert sigh of relief) are the ‘nu-metal’ influences that Max brought to his Soulfly work. Breaking up the onslaught of thrashing riffs are some slower grooves and heavy breakdowns which I think really adds to the album’s dynamics without losing any momentum.

In this sense, the album really surprised me, because I wasn’t bored by the end. Even when listening to my favourite metal albums (Slayer’s Reign in Blood and South of Heaven come to mind) I have the tendency to get tired of the speed and the brutality of the music by the end of the album. Thus, the fact that Inflikted managed to grab me at the beginning and hold my attention, and listening pleasure, through its duration, I think, says a lot for the album. The whole thing is just a really solid metal record that most fans of the genre should like and appreciate on a number of levels. I know I certainly did.

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